When we got up this morning it was raining, not the warm soft tropical droplets that we are used to, but hard cold missiles. Luckily we had a borrow umbrella from our airbnb, which had kindly been given to us by the sweet Indonesian girl in the downstairs room. We had not made any plans today except to go back to Ponto-chō during the day and to try and find the big shopping tunnels at Terramachi . There were three things we wanted to find; the temple where I had sent off my dad's spirit in 2011, the churros cafe with the grumpy guy who had played the same Jack Johnson Cd in both 2011 and 2012 and the Lupicia tea store.
Anyway we bought another umbrella and some sandwiches at Lawson's , walked back a block towards Gion and crossed over the Kama River . We then followed the crowd and walked East and soon found an arcade which was one of the arms that joined onto Terramachi . We window shopped for ages and then walked through the Nishiki Food Markets. There were piles of pickles and seafoods, and Japanese sweets of every kind but I resisted all temptation because the first time I came here we bought heaps of seafood and I ended up with food poisoning and was sick for our entire Hiroshima trip.
We are staying on the opposite side of the river this year so we found it really hard to get our bearings and sadly to say did not find a single one of our three spots. We ended up semi lost or displaced for hours and used McDonald's wifi to dowload a map which was then useless because we couldn't read the street names. I think in hindsight that we should have caught the subway home then chosen a temple to visit because we have decided not to cart kilos of souvenirs back with us this time.
Apart from our sandwich that morning we hadn't really eaten ( you can't count one egg tart) and so at 4pm we started looking for somewhere to eat breakfast - lunch . We took so long that all lunch places with sets that we liked were closed and we ended up at a pretty place a few flights up a riverview building. Alas this was our first eating disaster for some bizarre reason they were tardy in opening and did not have the food on the menu which had enticed us. It was a game rooster fighting special restaurant which also served horse sashimi. We picked three inoffensive items ( which also happened to be the cheapest) from the menu because we had noticed a table service surcharge ( which was not advertised downstairs ) which cost as much as our food.
It had become dark so we walked back home a bit dejected for a power nap. However our spirits hadn't been crushed because tonght was our long awaited night at Gion Gyosen for Shabu Shabu. Now the history behind this food mecca is; in 2011, after visiting the Yasaka Temple and photographing a Maiko whose party cheered "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, oi, oi, oi!" at us , we had stumbled upon a shabu shabu restaurant on the 4th floor of a tired looking building . My friend Liz had instructed me that this was a must do, (What's shabu shabu you might be wondering, well it's an all you can eat hotpot/steam boat situation.) For $20 per head you can go gung ho for 2 hours. ) On that visit we were in pig's heaven ( but did not write down the name) and when we came back for our honey moon the next year we had a little ad from the visitors centre for a shabu shabu restaurant and thought we'd try it. We of course couldn't find it and went to the local police station to ask for directions. The friendly policeman gave us directions and lo and behold it was our old favourite!
So now you understand why we had to go this year. And, yes we found it without a single hiccup. I was very self controlled this time and didn't overeat, i sat back with a cocktail and watched Eric take on the challenge. The food and service were once again perfect. I forgot to mention that when you got to the 4th floor it was very surprising because the space was immense and can cater for more than 100 people. This year we were adventurous and had yaki shabu so we had a grill as well as a steamboat. Before our two hours were up, we were up and out the door! It was time to go Maiko spotting. I know that sounds rude and terribly invasive but according to Trip Advisor thats what you do in Gion!
